Research
Projects & Dissertations

People-Centered Urban Planning, Mission Statement 2024

Everyday environments play an important role in peoples' health and wellbeing. More than 25% of health outcomes can be explained with where people live. Positive resources such as adequate housing or quality green spaces and negative 'stressors' such as noise and air pollution are unequally distributed across the city. As a result, life expectancy varies by up to 8 years between neighbourhoods in German cities. Urban health inequity has been amplified by the COVID-19 pandemic and is likely to increase in the coming post-pandemic years. The Chair of Urban Design and Planning develops innovative approaches in people-centred urban design. Our goal is to inform and help steer the much-needed transformation towards more inclusive and healthy cities. Our research delivers new empiric data on the connections between urban design and mental health, develops design strategies and recommendations for cities to integrate Design for All in urban development or informs transformation processes with theoretical concepts and new digital tools. Our research has been supported within the Heisenberg Program by the German Research Association (DFG) since 2021.

Completed research projects

Dissertations

Ongoing dissertation projects

Institutions and Open Spaces: How Urban Development Plans Affect Social Interactions

Gabriela Vilas Boas Ornelas
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll

In development as part of the DFG Research Training Group
Organizing Architectures

Restorative Effects of Streets in Densifying Urban Environments

Lanqing Gu M.Arch.
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll

Completed dissertation projects

Urban Design Strategies to Support Active Travel in Parents with Infants

Dr.-Ing. Gladys Vásquez Fauggier M.Sc.
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll

Measuring Multimodal Accessibility through Urban Spatial Configurations – Case Studies of three cities in the Rhein-Main Agglomeration

Dr.-Ing. Lakshya Pandit M.Tech.
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll

Intermodal Urban Open Spaces – An analysis of inner-city mobility stations in the Rhine-Main region

Dr.-Ing. Marianne Halblaub Miranda
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll
Second supervisor: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Petra Schäfer, Leiterin der Fachgruppe Neue Mobilität, FRA UAS

Socio-spatial Interaction (SSI): Design strategies to promote integration of elementary school-aged refugees in Berlin

Dr.-Ing. Chen Siqi M.A.
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll

Der Transitraum am Hub Flughafen. Analyse und Auswirkungen der Raumqualität und des Raumcharakters des Umsteigeweges auf das Wohlbefinden des/der Umsteigepassagiers/in.

Dr.-Ing. Lena Reiß
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr-Ing. Annette Rudolph-Cleff, Design and Urban Development (EST)
Co-speaker: Jun.-Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll

Women and the urban sanitation challenge: Tracing an intersectional relationship

Dr.-Ing. Anshika Suri
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr-Ing. Annette Rudolph-Cleff, Design and Urban Development (EST)
Co-speaker: Jun.-Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll

Inhabitants awareness toward conservation of urban heritage area – Case study of Darmo heritage area, Surabaya, Indonsesia

Dr.-Ing. Erika Astuti
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr-Ing. Annette Rudolph-Cleff, Design and Urban Development (EST)
Co-speaker: Jun.-Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll

Pervasive and Persuasive Serious Games

Dr.-Ing. Tim Dutz
at Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr. habil. Ralf Steinmetz, Multimedia Communication Lab (KOM)
Second supervisors: Dr. Stefan Göbel and Jun.-Prof. Dr. Ing. Martin Knöll

European Shopping Centre Architecture – in France and Italy

Dr.-Ing. Christian Seemann
Thesis supervisor and speaker: Prof. Dr-Ing. Annette Rudolph-Cleff, Design and Urban Development (EST)
Second supervisor: Prof. Alex Wall, TH Karlsruhe
Co-speaker: Jun.-Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll

Aircraft noise-induced annoyance in the vicinity of Cologne/Bonn Airport – The examination of short-term annoyance as well as their major determinants

Dr. phil. Susanne Bartels
at Department of Human Sciences, TU Darmstadt
Thesis supervisor: Prof. Dr. Joachim Vogt, Research group Work and Engineering Psychology
Second supervisor: Prof. Dr. Rainer Höger, Leuphana Universität Lüneburg
Member of the examining board: Jun.-Prof. Dr.-Ing. Martin Knöll